Regent Park is Canada’s oldest and largest social housing project having been built in the late 1940s and boasting the highest percentage of youth residents under the age of 18 in all of Toronto.

In the fall of 2005, as the buildings were in ill repair, The Toronto Community Housing Corporation (TCHC) began the Regent Park revitalization project to rebuild Regent Park over the next 10 years.

Critics argue that the new mixed-use development will reduce the amount of rent-geared-to-income units in Regent Park. As the project continues, residents of Regent Park will be displaced to other TCHC community developments across Toronto.

The purpose of the Regent Park Portraits was twofold:

1. To shift the focus of critics and the public from the politics surrounding the redevelopment process to the actual residents whose lives are in upheaval.

2. To change stigmas associated with Regent Park and get Torontonians to visit a diverse community whose future may redefine housing in city centres around the world.